Sheffield tree saga: City council to apologise to courts ‘by the end of the month, leader confirms

At a Strategy and Resource Policy committee meeting at Sheffield Town Hall, Coun Hunt, the leader of the council, revealed that they would formally apologise to the courts over the street tree saga.

A member of the public asked the question following the council’s failure to respond to a freedom of information (FOI) request for more than two months.

Campaigner Paul Brooke said he submitted his request on September 27 to confirm whether an apology to the courts had been made by the council over the scandal which saw 17,500 trees felled, some of which were healthy and should still be standing.

The council had until October 30 to respond but to date – December 14 – they are yet to get back to Mr Brooke.

Coun Hunt was yesterday (December 13) asked, in person, whether an apology had been made and if it was going to be made public.

He told the questioner and the members that “the apology to the court has not yet been sent”.

He said: “We need to make sure that the apology properly reflects the findings in the report of Sir Mark Lowcock.”

Coun Hunt added he had been assured that the apology would be sent to the court “by the end of this month”.

This, he said, will be made public.

Another public question raised the issue of a plaque that was promised to be unveiled at the town hall.

Members were told that Sheffield City Council had agreed to the installation of a plaque in the Town Hall entrance which would be, in the words of the officer who authored the report “in recognition of those who fought for our environmental heritage and were vindicated, and to serve as a reminder to all elected members that this failure of leadership will never happen again”.

This, according to the report, was expected in March 2024.

A member of the public asked for updates on this and whether an “unveiling ceremony” was to be held.

Coun Hunt said they were on schedule to unveil the plaque by March 6 and added the details of the unveiling ceremony would be published in due course.

The same person also told Coun Hunt and members of the committee that in May a motion was passed that said the resignation of cabinet members serving between 2015 and 2018 “would be an appropriate indication of acceptance of responsibility for the harms caused”.

He asked whether the council had done everything to comply with that.

In his response, Coun Hunt said there was nothing the council could do to “compel” members to resign.

He said the motion that was passed was “an expression of an opinion”.